Posts tagged “shy”

Normally around this time of year, I do a retrospective, but while a retrospective post (of sorts) is coming, right now I am looking forward.

I am so fucking tired of being asked why I am single. Why I don’t date more. Why I don’t have women just crawling all over me.

I don’t know how I am supposed to have the fucking answer to that question. Is it my failing? Theirs? Did the stars not align that week? Who fucking knows? What I do know, is that I have played and lost at this game so often that I know all the rules, all the side quests (including the one with the firebreathing dragon), and how to navigate many of the annoying puzzles.

At this point I have a fair idea of when I am being manipulated, managed, gaslighted, and when I should be waiting to be dumped by somebody who maybe thinks I haven’t noticed when they have suddenly disappeared from all forms of communication for a week even though I have had to chase them the fuck down.

The question is not why I am single. The question is why I put up with this bullshit at all. And I do, way too often.

Fuck. That.

So, 2015 is going to be the year that I stop. I am going to stop trying to chase down women who won’t be honest or communicative with me. I am going to stop trying to convince the people I date that I’m the one (or one of the people) for them. I am going to stop being the anchor for people who can’t fucking commit. I am going to stop putting up with the gaslighting and the radio silence. Fuck all of that. If people can’t recognize that I am worth chasing, wooing, caring for, and communicating clearly and honestly with, then I’m out.

2015 is the year of the Whiskeypants. I’m brilliant, hilarious, kind, generous, and loving. I have a short pudgy body that is soft, warm, and extremely cuddly, and you’d be lucky to feel it next to you.

And if it turns out nobody is into that, fuck it. I have a cat, a Roku, and a sexy fucking motorcycle. I’m good.

I

There’s this woman, with whom I have almost become acquainted. Almost. By that, I mean I have spoken to her, once. Sorta. I don’t actually know how drunk I was when I managed to get those words out, but the fact that enough whiskey had been consumed for me to talk to her suggests…very.

The thing is, I find her so mindbogglingly hot I cannot bring myself to talk to her. I cannot even look her in the eyes. When our eyes do by some accident meet, I feel like I’ve been knocked on my ass, and every last bit of the clever snarkiness you expect from me vanishes. Gone. Poof. So, you know. It totally makes sense that I don’t let myself within five feet of her.

II

There’s this woman I’ve known for some time, now. She’s ridiculous; talented; brilliant; strange. I love looking her in the eyes; her eyes are so expressive, they practically have their own vocabulary. I am certain I can never tell her this, or how beautiful I think she is.

It’s all over the internet. On blogs. On Twitter. People bitch about it on Facebook. As you can see on this informative Tumblr, it’s all over OKCupid.

It’s bullshit.

There is this whole idea that, just because a dude is nice to a woman she should want to fuck him. It’s an inherently misogynist perspective on what it means to be friends with a woman you want, but for whatever reason, cannot have. It implies that said woman owes you something for your kindness and friendship. Sorry “nice guys”, she doesn’t owe you a goddamn thing, and the friendzone is something made up by “nice guys” who would rather blame the women around them for the fact that they are single than take a look at themselves.Why are those other guys getting the women? It’s not because they are assholes. It’s because they go after what they want. It’s because they make themselves desirable—and I am not just talking about looks and money, I am talking about charm, wit, and a willingness to use them both when the times are right. I’m no looker, guys, and I am broke most of the time (hell, I spent two years way, way underemployed), but I have never had any problem convincing women to spend time with me. And I do this by virtue of 1. Humor and wit; 2. Intelligence and observation; 3. Not being a whiny little bitch who can’t take responsibility for my own shit; 4. The ability to say, “Hey, I totally dig you”; 5. The ability to accept it if the feeling is not returned.

So let me make something clear: You have NOT been friendzoned. You are a FRIEND. So, dude. Stop thinking with your dick and be a good friend. When your crush is telling you all about her relationship problems, don’t make it about you and whether she should be with you. If you must be narcissistic in the moment, then pay attention. You are learning what not to do in other relationships. Don’t decide that being an asshole is the answer. Don’t put that ridiculous bitterness all over the internet. It accomplishes nothing and—big surprise—makes you look like an asshole, and one that no woman is gonna want. Turns out, chicks don’t dig whiners. Weird, right?

If she doesn’t have romantic feelings about you, don’t whine about it. Your options are: 1. Decide you are cool being her friend and let go of the fantasy; 2. Let go of the friendship if you can’t let go of the fantasy (sticking around and pining isn’t going to change her mind about you, but moving on and growing will make you feel better and may help her see you in another light); or 3. Stick around doing the same old thing, pining and listening and wondering why she isn’t fucking you instead of that other dude when you are SOOO much nicer to her.

But dude, if you really think she owes you something because you have provided a willing ear, you are not a nice guy. If you really think she’s obligated to want to be with you just because you give her relationship advice and are always there for her, you are not a nice guy. If you think a woman should be something she isn’t just because you want her to be and you think you deserve it, you are not a nice guy. You are just a dude who needs to grow up and move on.

I would like to have this little placard in card form, so that I might hand it to new friends and new lovers, since asking them to go Google introverts and INTJs is like saying, “Yeah, I’m awesome and everything, but I’m assigning you some homework before we go any further.” However, it has been made abundantly and repeatedly clear to me that such homework is actually necessary.

Three years of my life were spent in love with an extrovert, and if that taught me anything, it’s that extroverts make the social rules by default. They are the point of reference for how such things as social aptitude and behavior are measured. They are the people against whom introverts are measured, which is inherently unfair, but true.

Media enforces this. It’s the rare movie or television show that allows introverts to remain introverts; most paint it as a triumph when an introverted character is brought out of his or her introvert cocoon to become a beautiful extroverted butterfly. Introversion has become something that can and should be “cured,” somehow. It is often conflated with antisocial behavior, which is bullshit, because introverts are often very social beings. Just not within the same parameters as extroverts.

Thus, in order to make their way in the world, introverts must somehow meet the social expectations created by extroverts. If they don’t, they are often misunderstood and shunned. If they do, this means they are constantly functioning outside of their comfort zone, which just isn’t healthy. It’s exhausting, and makes social interaction that much more work. I have managed to learn how to navigate as an introvert in a sea of extroverts, and because of this I have many wonderful friends. I fake it so well, in fact, that people still respond with surprise and horror when I tell them I am an introvert. However, the extroverts among my friends are generally pretty sensitive to the needs of the introverts in their midst. I would not be able to maintain the level of social interaction that I do if this were not true.

So this placard, which offers a dozen very simple, but very essential ways to respect the introverts in our lives, to consider their needs, and to understand that they are not just waiting for somebody to turn them from sad little introverted seed pods into bright and colorful extroverted flowers, is just freakin’ rad.

So, I have this problem: I have no fucking idea when a woman is interested in me. None whatsoever. All the signs in the world might be present, but if those signs are not written in Sharpie on card stock and if they are not extremely explicit (like, “HI WHISKEYPANTS I WANT YOU OMG SO BAD LIKE WHOA COME TAKE MY CLOTHES OFF I AM THE 99%”) and if I am not beaten over the head with those signs…? Turns out, I’m clueless.

Turns out, I miss a lot of opportunities.

Turns out—fail.

This is plainly an issue of self-esteem. I always assume that the gorgeous, delightful, impossibly sexy woman with whom I am speaking (or with whom I am flirting, if I get up the nerve) has much better and hotter prospects and thus is not at all interested in me. Sometimes I am right. Sometimes I discover I am very wrong. Sometimes, after an encounter, I discuss with my friends and they say things like, “So then, you kissed her, right?” And then I say things like, “No. Was I supposed to?” And then they smack me upside the head and/or mock me, and I am left to wonder: Should I have kissed her?

Now, I know that I am actually a pretty decent catch for both short- and long-term relationships. I’m smart, funny, kind, and my looks frighten away neither small children nor animals. But knowing that doesn’t help me to know whether somebody is thinking, “Hey, I dig that Whiskeypants person.” And I don’t think I am ever going to be cocky enough to assume.

But you know, this post isn’t about the fact that I’m an idiot with regard to the beautiful women who surround me. Ultimately, that’s just fact: I am an idiot with regard to beautiful women.

This post is just to say:

Women—

If you are at all into me, if you think you might want to hang out, or make out, or get drinks, or let me carry you to my bed—IN THE NAME OF ALL THAT IS HOLY, UNHOLY, OR JOSS WHEDON PLEASE TELL ME.

When I tell people I have a guitar, very often they say things like, “Are you in a band?” or “Will you play a song for me?” or “That’s nice, let’s watch TV.” And I have finally figured out why that last reaction is my favorite.

I love guitar, and I love music. I don’t love the fact that I am essentially unskilled, but I love that I can learn new songs by finding lessons on the internet and sing them to my cat and inadvertently to neighbors who are, I assume, pretty pissed off at this point. But I get major performance jitters even when there’s only one other person in the roomhouse. I have no intention of ever really performing. So, why am I bothering to learn and practice and even occasionally come up with new ways to sing covers?

Sure, there’s reward in all of these things—learning, mastery (for some definition of the word), entertainment, growth, creation and love. That’s the trite bullshit I’ve been telling myself from day one. But I realized today that I’m really doing this for one reason: potential hostage situations.

I’m doing this: learning new songs, and practicing semi-regularly because—and this could totally happen—I might someday be in a situation where I have to be able to play between one and five songs competently if somebody hands me a guitar and holds a gun to my (or somebody else’s) head. Alternately, I could find myself in a Goonies-related situation where every chord I play correctly helps get me and my friends across a booby-trapped floor. Or I could be surrounded by a horde of hippie zombies and have to fool them into thinking I’m one of them by lurching about and gently playing Bob Dylan.